Meanwhile, on this side of the Atlantic,
Donald Trump explicitly suggesting he'd launch revenge tour
if he sent back to the white House. The New York Times. Maggie Haberman joins me now. Maggie, my question at this point is not
whether or not he's talking about revenge, whether or not he wants revenge. He did in his first term. He's said it repeatedly in this campaign. But in the past when he said it, he's
kind of tried to pivot a couple days later saying, no, no, no. The real revenge will be
the success of the American people. His advisers have said the same thing. They're not even trying to hedge
at this point. Is that fair? I don't think his advisers, at least
some of them, are especially happy with how explicit he's being right now,
but explicit he is being. And I think that we have seen
for eight years, people come up with rationalizations
for why you shouldn't take him at his word when he's saying
what he is going to do now. He was prevented from doing what he wanted
to do at various points when he was president previously. And, you know, he
he went into office saying he didn't want to hurt the Clintons
any more. But then within months,
he was talking to Jeff Sessions, the attorney general, about reopening
an investigation into Hillary Clinton. He wanted John Kerry prosecuted. I mean, I can go down the list. And so we want James Comey prosecuted. there is no reason to think
that any of those desires would change. And what he is looking for and Jonathan Swan and Charlie Savage
and I've written about this, is lawyers who will help him get to a
yes on various fronts. in a second administration,
he is talking about eroding the post-Watergate norm of Justice
Department independence. And so I don't see any reason why people would not believe him
and his allies when they say this. Can we dig it on this a little bit? Because again, to to your point, I feel like you talk to Republicans
and say, well, he said this in the past, so they talk to Republicans
and say, well, he you should be pissed about what happened
because they don't like the New York case. This is different
because of who's going to be around him, and the kind of the guardrails
that have either been winnowed, diminished,
or don't exist anymore. If he's in a second four years of office,
what authority does he have as president? If people say yes to him?
Look, it's a one thing. There are plenty of people
who say that he has a right to be upset with the New York case,
and that they think it shouldn't have been brought in the first place. and that he has a right to be upset
with the outcome. Number one, in terms of the outcome, we'll never know
whether, having a better defense plan might have actually won that case,
but they didn't really have one. and and maybe it wasn't winnable anyway. but there's a difference
between being upset about the outcome of a case
and saying, therefore, I'm going to go after everybody. Number one,
you have to have bases for crimes. You can't just go and manufacture events. Number one, the argument against Manhattan case
is that the law was contorted in a way to make it possible. what he can do
is he can order the Justice Department to open various investigations. again, they would have to have grounds,
but they could do that. What his allies are calling for, right now
is that state attorneys general or local Republican district attorneys
who might have some overlap with aspects of current investigations into Trump allies, should therefore open
investigations into the investigators. And that is something that we have seen
before. Remember,
the Durham investigation was all about investigating the Russia investigation
into the Trump campaign. That's what they're calling for
before he gets in office. Once he is in office, the DOJ is
sort of a black hole that he can use. How we've seen from his allies. You guys wrote a great story. you and Juan and Charlie about his allies
are being very explicit about the revenge tour
that they would like Trump to go on. How serious is he about that? How much is this a focal point for him
right now? It's very much a focal point for him
right now. I mean, again, he was Sean Hannity,
who is a Trump friend, offered him multiple opportunities to say, no, no, no,
I don't think that we should use the system against our enemies.
And Trump just wouldn't do it. And he was actually more explicit in that
that clip you played with Doctor Phil, Trump might be tempering somewhat
his language publicly, but he is very focused on this,
behind the scenes. He does want to see retribution. He is not in a in a happy place. He said a few times in the wake of the,
his conviction. And he'd be okay with with prison time. He'd be okay with jail. Well, I don't I don't happen to believe
that he would be okay with prison time or jail. And I don't know very many people who are actually okay with or happy
with the idea in his defense, to be there. and we're talking
about a very complicated notion when it comes to a former president
who has a Secret Service detail. But no, I do not think Donald Trump actually wants to be in prison
and is okay with it. One of the kind of allies
former allies, Colonel, is. I'm never totally sure.
that was calling for execution. Steve Bannon
looks like he's headed, to jail as well. And so the question I always have,
which is how in the loop is he right now? How directly connected to the former
president is he? It's a good question. So a couple of things. I mean, I think Steve Bannon is still hoping
that there's going to be some kind of Supreme Court
intervention in his case. So, we'll see if that happens. but if not, he is supposed to report
to prison on July 1st. Bannon, has both direct contact with Trump and direct contact
with a lot of people around Trump. So he has a bunch of different inputs. but Bannon's biggest influence right now
comes from his his podcast, War Room, which is incredibly influential
in the right wing ecosystem. it, it
it helps set the tone and set the terms of the discussion around what other
aspects of the right wing ecosystem do. And so some of it is hearing from Trump
directly, and some of it is the show helping program. What Trump says when you we've spent so much time
focused on the trial or focused on, you know,
when Donald Trump talks about revenge, when you talk to campaign folks right now,
it raised a ton of money over the course of the last couple weeks.
No question. I think Republicans have once again
kind of coalesced around him, in the wake of a New York case. Where do they feel like
things stand six months out? They don't know. I look, five months is a very long time
electorally. most Republicans,
they're diehard Donald Trump Republican supporters are adamant
that this is going to help him. Republican
strategists who have run in past campaign, run past campaigns
would like him to talk about this less. they just don't think that this is
especially helpful to be talking about the court case
or the details or, retribution all the time that it can scare
swing voters and it can scare others. and it can have a secondary effect,
which is that in this climate of threats of political violence increasing,
do people take up on that call? So those are risks. has it help with the money delivery? Absolutely. In terms of small dollar support,
if he gets jail time on July 11th when he has a sentencing, Republicans expect that will help him
fundraise, dramatically, too. And there's no reason
not to think that it will. But I don't think anybody thinks that
this is something they would have sought out
for a general election, right? Despite how they might try and frame it,
which, as you would expect them to try and spin something like that.
Can I ask you? I picked up been talking to Republicans over the course of the last couple
of weeks. Republicans that I wouldn't expect to,
like Donald Trump, have made very clear they didn't want to support
Donald Trump, were outraged after January 6th, probably
didn't like him in his first term. Are so mad about the New York case that
they're just in a different place now. I think that's true. I mean, listen, they're part
of the difference between the New York. If you I was talking to
somebody about this the other day, if you look at the cases against Trump,
there's a spectrum, the documents case, the Mar-A-Lago case in Florida,
that's really pretty clean cut. And that's a
that's a traditional application of the law about classified documents and more specifically,
obstructing the efforts to retrieve them. Then there's the J6 federal investigation and the Georgia case,
which is sort of novel legal theory in the Manhattan case,
which is on its own. there are a lot of people
who are very exercised about this now. I think that some of them use it as a justification
to get where they wanted to get anyway. but that's where we are. Yeah. Important point on that last one,
Maggie. Everyone, always a pleasure. Thanks so much. Appreciate.
